


"I am your family and you shall be mine"

by someoneyoucantstand



Category: Victoria (TV)
Genre: 2x08, Canon, Funeral, M/M, Major character death - Freeform, canon character death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-27
Updated: 2019-06-27
Packaged: 2020-05-20 18:22:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,176
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19382221
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/someoneyoucantstand/pseuds/someoneyoucantstand
Summary: Alfred simply wishes to say his last goodbyes without the prying eyes of society; for it is only then that he can release what true emotions he feels for the man he had caught affection for - the man he wished to hold once more like they had done in the beauty of the Scottish highlands





	"I am your family and you shall be mine"

The air was crisp, the morning of February 1st. The night previous, the last moon fall of January, had been a cold one which had layered the green grasses with thin white as the wetness of the dew turned to frost. The cemetery church that placed itself in the centre of the graves – almost like some sick and cruel maze – opened its doors as a mournful party donning  black began to exit.

At the head of the party was the slick mahogany coffin carried on the shoulders of six pale, grieving faces.  They were trailed by three women, all donning black laced veils and clutching onto the arms of each other as they stifled small sobs. From there, it was family, friends, and then acquaintances.

Lord Alfred was situated at the front.

He had carried the coffin in on his shoulder, leading the party with a Mr Robert Peel on the other side, and was once again carrying it outwards onto the grounds and into the grave.

He had been invited as a friend of the man, as it was noted by his dear fiancée that the two were close; when outings at the palace were also partook by those of parliament, the men would have idle chat, standing by each other when duty was need not.

A friend.

He was invited as a _friend._

Invited as a friend by the woman who claimed to have captured his heart.

Alfred knew that to be false.

For he had to watch family wipe away heavy tears as the doting love dropped a flower onto the casket before the heavy rain of dirt began whilst he schooled his emotions. For he could not show the emotions he truly felt – he could only show the level of emotion that would be appropriate of a friend made through their occupations.

Alfred had struggled a great deal during the service. He had been situated on the second row, meaning he could not led his shoulders shake unless to give away the heavy weight of emotions that was pilling on top of him.

As much as he was invited as a friend, he was family. As a child, you are taught that you can be whatever you wish and, although that statement is chased away as youth fleets and obligation came, the two men had fitfully wished that they were family. When they had lay together in his town house, skin on skin, on those rare nights were Alfred could fully stole away without the looming need to be at the Palace at a prompt notion, they had pressed their lips to each other’s and to the bare skin of necks, cheeks, arms, the smooth abdomens that trailed down to their-

-and they had whispered. They whispered softly to each other that _“I am your family and you shall be mine, regardless of lawful views”,_ the words falling like a comfortable blanket around their ears.

Except now it was all over and he had to stand there as a mere friend – the notion of it swirled as a sickness in his gut – and observe the false love of one Lady Florence as she pretty cried into a white handkerchief.

 _Maybe it was not to her_ , Alfred thought, as he watched her. However, Alfred knew that the love was not a true one – it was a political move to secure his beloved’s career in the Houses. Florence may very well have held a romantic love but it was one sided, not reciprocated in the way she felt.

Two men were making progress of the dropping of soil – a hasted pace was covering his love head to toe in dirt, burying in him six feet underneath the ground where Alfred could not reach no matter how hard he wished.

Alfred watched as an aging man placed a hand on the arm of the aging women in the middle of the trio.

That was the only signal needed for the party to turn on their heels and slowly lead the way from the filling gape of the ground. In reversed order from the Church, acquaintances led the friends who led the family who led those closest to him- mother, father, sweet little sister, brother and a brother and a third brother, and finally, fiancée.

The trail past Alfred who stayed rooted – he could not focus on movement if he was to focus on holding his emotions down like a solider should.

“Lord Alfred,” a soft voice spoke as they past. Lady Florence stood before him, with a small red nose and wet eyes. “Are you to join us? He would have wanted you there. He thought so highly of you, Mr Paget.”

 _He would have wanted only me,_ Alfred’s thoughts snarled. Instead, he cleared his throat and solemnly smiled, “of course, my Lady. I shall be with you all in a short while.”

Florence nodded and continued on her way, seeking comfort from the sister who should have been comforting his true love.

With the last few people leaving over the hill towards the carriages and the two men finished with their handiwork as they too progressed away, Alfred finally allowed himself to breathe. Now was his time to say the goodbye that was needed for the strongest of bond a pair can hold. He found himself faulting in step as he neared the fleshly laid ground.

This was it – once he fell upon the grave, once he saw the newly carved letters in stone and felt the smooth shaping’s, he knew he could no longer ignore what had occurred. Nevertheless he pressed forward – he had to say goodbye – he had whisper their love aloud to the wind or else never forgive himself that he lost this last moment for it would likely be seen as improper to appear of his own will to the final resting place of a simple friend he had known since not even a boy, only two years at best.

 

 

_In memorial_

_EDWARD DRUMMOND_

_A son, a brother, a man of the workings of this country, taken by the grace of the Lord himself and carried onwards to the lights of good Heaven._

_30 March 1814 – January 25 th 1843._

 

 

 

Alfred felt his cheeks become wet with freshly shed tears that he no longer tried to hide as his allowed his fingers to run in and out of the letterings, feeling the grooves and bumps before he stopped short, his hand pulling back and hovering over the name

Edward Drummond.

“My love,” Alfred choked, resting his palm flat on the name carved in cold stone, “my love, what did you do?”

He felt his chest tighten as he slowly traced the name and before he knew it, a sobbed escaped his lips. He attempted in vein so stifle another, however a third pushed onwards and escaped into the silence of the cemetery.

Alfred’s eyes burned as more tears rolled.

“My love, you are an idiot!” He quietly cried. “You idiot, why did you take a bullet with the name of another upon it?”

There was no answer and so he continued.  

“It was not for you! There is nothing anyone could hate about you, dear. For you are – were – a good man, a gracious man! Nobody wished to harm you – why did you do it!?” Again, there was no reply other than the minute sounds of wind whistling through the overhanding trees.

“Sir Peel is a noble man – a worthy man of respect and good graces – but he is not you! My affections are not directed towards such a man! Be it seen as treason I do not care, for I would rather him take 20 and 1 bullets if it meant to I could hold you in my arms once more. A country without Peel does not compare closely to my world without you, my dearest Edward.”

Alfred pulled his hand away and rubbed it up and down his face, pushing his palms into his eyes. The pressure of such an action created small patterns in his vision that stayed momentarily once he removed them.

He let his arms fall as he stood there, staring at the ground that separated him from the only thing he truly cared about in this world.

“You are gone, Edward,” Alfred told himself, “you are gone and I can no longer hold you. What am I to do now? How will I go on? My days were passed easily on a countdown of when my skin would next touch yours and our lips would fall onto each other’s ears.

“We should not have fought – it was stupid and I apologies. Maybe had that not occurred you and I would have been in a different moment on the day of the five and twenty.”

It was getting cold now. The air was no longer crisp but instead turning to bitterness that nipped at Alfred’s ears – _almost like Edward used to do_.

“I don’t quite know what to do with myself now, Edward.” Alfred huffed a breath and looked around at the surrounding graves, of people dead long people. “I don’t even know where you are or how to find you upon my own demise-” at this thought, he laughed “- although I suppose it shall not matter. For man who lies with another man shall only end up in one place, as they teach us. I imagine I shall be in that place too, wherever you have been sent.”

Alfred reached into the insides of his coat, fingering the object he had placed there for safe keeping.

“I wish to hold you again, my dearest. I wish to smell your scent and run my lips upon your smooth skin. You when bathed in the moonlight from your window will forever be my favourite sight – a sight I shall recall in the most trying times.”

He pulled out the small object, slowly turning it between his hands.

“It was such an extraordinary night – the night of the ball,” Alfred recalled, “watching with stolen glances as you shone on the dance floor. You looked so agreeable in that outfit. I loved watching you, my lovely. When we were to be watching the poets on the highlands; instead my eyes fell onto your nape.”

The weight of the object made him smile.

“Of course, the highlands. Our first – and, I regret, our only – moment in the freshness of the open air. I remember your hold on my waist like it was only moments ago. And I remember the shock but instant comfort and love I felt when your lips graced mine for the first time.”

It was then that, after a moment of hesitation, Alfred got down on his knees and began digging at the freshly laid dirt. If his mother – or quite frankly anyone of noble standing –could see him now, playing in the dirt, there would be horror not only for his sanity but for his trousers.

“And of course, our times on the balcony. We always did find our ways to that point at the end of a night. It was there that I remarked about the fairer sex – watching you smile brightened my day for it was a signal that we would be on the same page.”

 A sizeable hole was dug now. It was not so deep that it reached more than a foot and a half, however it was not so shallow that it would become uncovered and wash away the object.

It was now that he stopped and leant back on his heels.

“Although, despite that, quite possibly my favour moment of the balcony was on the night time, when the sky had blackened. You had appeared and sparked a cigar alight. I shall never dismiss the feelings I felt upon seeing your most gorgeous features highlighted by the warm flickering light of that spark. Why, my love, it was simply _breath-taking_.”

Alfred thought fondly on that moment, as tears fell once again. As not to streak his skin with mud, Alfred allowed them to fall, rushing down his face and dripping underneath his chin.

He felt himself laugh without humour before reaching to the side to retrieve the item he had placed their in his dig.

He ran his hand over it, eyes closed as he envisioned his love glowing in the orange light of fire. His chest felt tight but nevertheless he persisted in placing the object in the ground with such care that it would rival a midwife playing a new born into its mother’s arms.

“Please know I love you,” Alfred began as he threw dirt into the hole, “and that I shall never love another as I have loved you, Edward Drummond.”

When the last handfuls of dirt had been thrown on top, he smiled to himself, and also to the carved name in the stone in front of him.

“There you are -,” he choked on his own tears as his vision became blinded by them, but continued forward 

 “-A tinderbox for you, my love.”

**Author's Note:**

> I made myself cry writing this. I miss our boys.


End file.
